Palm Beach traffic: Okeechobee Boulevard getting a 3-year makeover

Monday

All of the above are part of West Palm Beach’s plan to fix what ails Okeechobee Boulevard, the city’s increasingly trafficked and pedestrian-unfriendly approach to downtown.

City commissioners got an update last week on key recommendations coming out of consultants Alta Planning + Design’s mobility study, a prime part of which zeroes in on the stretch of Okeechobee Boulevard that carries thousands of cars daily from Interstate 95, past Australian Avenue, over the Tri-Rail tracks, past Tamarind Avenue, the Kravis Center, Convention Center, CityPlace, the FEC/Brightline tracks, South Dixie Highway and the Royal Park Bridge over the Intracoastal Waterway to Palm Beach.

READ: All four lanes of the new Flagler Memorial Bridge now open

Those items are ones the city hopes to tackle in the next three years, Assistant City Administrator Scott Kelly said. The projects will require cooperation from county departments, the Florida Department of Transportation, the U.S. Coast Guard and other government bodies, not to mention downtown stakeholders, from residents to businesses and the marine industry, he said.

A look at what you’ll see first:

Signal timing: After studying backups at various intersections, consultants determined that overly long signal changes contribute to traffic and can be fixed by shortening the amount of time it takes for lights to cycle from red to green. A consultant also is working on how to synchronize traffic signals to help cars flow more quickly, especially in light of Brightline’s high speed rail service start-up, which will send 32 trains crossing Okeechobee on their way through downtown every day.

The city will send its recommendations to the county, which controls signalization, and to the state, which controls the boulevard, for approval and implementation. "We’ve all got to work together," Kelly said.

Bridge openings: The city wants to convince the Coast Guard to hold off on opening the Royal Park Bridge during morning rush hour, which backs up traffic onto Okeechobee. There’s an application process that can take six months to a year to complete.

"We’re trying to get started on it," said Kelly, who added that "it’s a more laborious process than I imagined."

Before filing the application, the city will seek to gather resolutions in favor of the change from the county commission, Palm Beach’s Town Council, West Palm’s city commission and such groups as the Marine Industries Association of South Florida, to buttress its case for the change.

Street lighting: People have been asking for better street lighting for years, Kelly said. "Those intersections are dark out there." The need to brighten them showed up on a Florida Department of Transportation study a year ago and the city has been pressing for improvements ever since.

Though it’s a state responsibility, he said, the city hopes to speed the process by undertaking the lighting design work and figuring out how to pay for that. Improved lighting is more for pedestrian safety than traffic flow. "It scares me," he said. "People running across the street, trying to beat the traffic, it’s dangerous."

Signs to help pedestrians and drivers: "Improved wayfinding," is what the traffic planners call it. Helping out-of-towners know where they’re going helps and doesn’t cost much.

Road re-striping: "We want high-visibility crosswalks," Kelly said. Again, it’s the state’s responsibility on Okeechobee but the city is looking to help. The city also wants to narrowing the travel lanes, a technique proven to reduce speeding, he said.

Shade trees: West Palm has employed a number of consultants to look for ways to improve downtown life and just about all have recommended adding shade trees — not palm trees — to reduce heat and glare for pedestrians on sidewalks.

Buses and trolleys: West Palm Beach’s trolley system has proven popular, to the point where developers are being required to contribute to operational costs as a condition of obtaining building permits. As the county’s PalmTran bus agency works on a plan to improve its routes, the city plans expand trolley service and to work with PalmTran to coordinate the bus and trolley systems. Kelly also said the city could put its trolleys on the app PalmTran riders use to see where on the route a bus is, or when the next one is coming.

He predicts that in the next five to 10 years, self-driving vans will start replacing trolleys, with the city using grants to purchase the vehicles. The lower operating costs of vehicles without drivers would allow the city to have more vans and more frequent service, he said. Autonomous vans also might be used to take bus riders the so-called "last mile," from bus stop to home, he said. Tampa already is testing autonomous vans, he said.